Punjab Kings continued their trend of being the most exciting team of IPL 2024 with another nail biting finish against the Mumbai Indians.

Ashutosh Sharma provided yet another reminder to never count PBKS out when he is at the crease. Sharma gave his all to bring us back into a game that we had no hope of winning at the beginning of the run chase. Despite his heroics, we eventually lost the match by 9 runs.

Here we must also give a special mention to Shashank Singh, Harpreet Brar, and Kagiso Rabada for giving it their best to chase the score set by Mumbai Indians. Thrillers have been the case in the matches against Mumbai and tonight was no different.

Talking about this game, Sam Curran won the toss and put the Mumbai Indians into bat. We brought in Rilee Rossouw in place of Jonny Bairstow. Mumbai started well with the bat, as Ishan Kishan and Rohit Sharma were scoring runs at a brisk pace. Kagiso Rabada brought us our first breakthrough as he sent Ishan Kishan packing.

Suryakumar Yadav came out to bat and played some lovely shots. He, along with Rohit Sharma, stitched an 81-run stand before Sharma was dismissed by Sam Curran.

We slowed things down with the wicket of Sharma as the boundaries dried up. SKY and Tilak Varma then opened up and scored quick runs. Our skipper dismissed the dangerous Suryakumar Yadav for 78 but contributions from Hardik Pandya, Tilak Varma and Tim David helped Mumbai reach 192 in their 20 overs.

Harshal Patel bowled a brilliant spell and picked up 3 wickets in his 4 overs while Curran picked up 2 and Rabada picked up 1.

In reply, we got off to a poor start as we lost Prabhsimran Singh in the first over off the bowling of Gerald Coetzee and then we saw a Bumrah special in the second over as he sent back Rilee Rossouw and Sam Curran as well. We lost Liam Livingstone in the next over as well and we looked down and out.

Our Impact Player Harpreet Bhatia along with Shashank Singh tried to resurrect our innings but Bhatia fell to Shreyas Gopal in the 7th over. Jitesh Sharma did not last long as he was dismissed for 9. That is when our man in form, Ashutosh Sharma came out to bat. He started to attack from ball one and kept us in the game. Shashank Singh also played a few shots to reach 41 before Bumrah dismissed him to put Mumbai on top. Ashutosh and Brar were not ready to give up yet though. Sharma continued to put pressure on Mumbai’s bowlers and hit some lovely shots, including an eye-catching six off Jasprit Bumrah’s bowling. He reached his first IPL fifty and kept us in the game.

Sharma and Brar took 24 runs from Akash Madhwal’s over to bring the equation down to 28 in 4 overs. Bumrah bowled a superb over and then Coetzee dismissed Ashutosh.

Brar fell to Hardik Pandya before Rabada hit a six to bring the target down to 12 in the last over. Unfortunately, Rabada was run out off the first ball of the last over to help Mumbai win by 9 runs.

Phew! What a game it was! We were simply looking down and out but the character shown by our Shers in the middle overs of the run chase was mighty impressive. Ashutosh Sharma almost took us to victory out of nowhere. That shows our determination to win. We have one final game left in Mullanpur and it is against the Gujarat Titans on Sunday, 21st April. Hang tight for another brilliant game.

Brief Scores: Mumbai Indians 192/7 in 20 overs (Suryakumar Yadav 78, Rohit Sharma 36, Harshal Patel 3/31) defeated Punjab Kings 183 all out in 19.1 overs (Ashutosh Sharma 61, Shashank Singh 41, Jasprit Bumrah 3/21)

Man of the Match: Jasprit Bumrah